


it never did belong to me

by bessemerprocess



Category: Vikings (TV)
Genre: Boat Building, Boats and Ships, Five Minute Warning Meme, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-03-24
Updated: 2013-03-24
Packaged: 2017-12-06 08:08:43
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 204
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/733437
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bessemerprocess/pseuds/bessemerprocess
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Floki always holds his breath when his boats hit the water.</p>
            </blockquote>





	it never did belong to me

**Author's Note:**

> Written for amadi's Five Minute Warning Meme.

Floki always holds his breath when his boats hit the water. They never sink, not since he was five, and he built a raft on the pond by his father's house. His boats are strong now, and waterfast. He knows the ways of the wood, and the sing of the iron on iron as he clenches the planks to one another. His hands smell of flax and lanolin and pine tar from the caulking, and salt and wet from the sea. With each boat he rebuilds his soul, asking Thor for luck, and good winds. With each boat he sends a piece of himself away out onto the water, to fish, to raid, to live.

Off they go, his boats into the water, to sail far away. They are him, every ounce of himself he can pour into the rib cages of wood and the fleet feet of woolen sail. They are him, but they are never his. The boats leave, and Floki starts again. One day he may wake to find he has poured his entire being out, but for today, he will hunt the forest for the perfect keel timber to make himself a new spine on which to build this boat.


End file.
